Compare and contrast subject and theme Your answer should be 3 to 4 sentences

Some assignments use words—like compare, contrast, similarities, and differences—that make it easy for you to see that they are asking you to compare and/or contrast. Here are a few hypothetical examples:

Compare and contrast Frye’s and Bartky’s accounts of oppression.

Compare WWI to WWII, identifying similarities in the causes, development, and outcomes of the wars.

Contrast Wordsworth and Coleridge; what are the major differences in their poetry?

Notice that some topics ask only for comparison, others only for contrast, and others for both.

But it’s not always so easy to tell whether an assignment is asking you to include comparison/contrast. And in some cases, comparison/contrast is only part of the essay—you begin by comparing and/or contrasting two or more things and then use what you’ve learned to construct an argument or evaluation. Consider these examples, noticing the language that is used to ask for the comparison/contrast and whether the comparison/contrast is only one part of a larger assignment:

Choose a particular idea or theme, such as romantic love, death, or nature, and consider how it is treated in two Romantic poems.

How do the different authors we have studied so far define and describe oppression?

Compare Frye’s and Bartky’s accounts of oppression. What does each imply about women’s collusion in their own oppression? Which is more accurate?

In the texts we’ve studied, soldiers who served in different wars offer differing accounts of their experiences and feelings both during and after the fighting. What commonalities are there in these accounts? What factors do you think are responsible for their differences?

1.d

1.e                                  

2.c

3.c

an old person

explanation: